While I was on a horse ride in the hills of Gulmarg, Kashmir , the horse rider asked me from which place I am from. When I replied ‘Madras’ (then Chennai), his immediate query was baffling , “How is Rajnikanth?”. Here is a humble horse rider, lived all through his life in Kashmir, doesn’t know to read or write, have ignorance over the other parts of India and anger over the Indian Government over the attitude shown towards kashmir than other states of India which he mentions one of the reasons for the conflict happening there, can enquire about Rajni. Considering the career graph of Rajnikanth, its quite an achievement as he had worked in minimal North Indian Films.

Born, brought up and lived all my life than the past 18 months in Chennai, I can’t deny the influence of Rajni. Considering the following that film actors have in South India, its not surprising. But the adulation Rajni commands is phenomenal. Film Industry, as its called had never been an Industry in India. Its often used as the best place for biggies to convert their Unaccounted wealth to Accountables and a cushion bed for mafia to work around .Though the scenario is changing, it hasn’t been wiped off. Surviver should not only be fit but also powerful. Talent and Attitude takes back seat while influence and dynasty rules.Born and brought up in Bengaluru from a humble background, this man has risen to the stars. There has always been an argument that he doesnt deserve this as Kamal Haasan, his contempory is better by miles.Though its quite fair, its the sheer screen presence that makes him special.Indian audience doesnt have the luxury to have their own Superman or Spiderman(Though I strongly believe our Lord Hanuman is the benchmark Hollywood had for creating those imaginary heroes) on the big screen and they fill the gap by making few larger than life on screen.

Psychologists have declared few theories on human survival, what achievement means for him and its reasons.They point out few things that man want to conquer for his presence. Fear top the charts, which man feels can be conquered by money, wealth, power, education etc. The next in the list is the ability to make everybody round him accept and love him. The latter is more a tough job to achieve I feel, that too an unconditional acceptance is far from ordinary task, perhaps the greatest of them being Charlie Chaplin, In India apart from Amitabh and Rajni, nobody has that acceptance in film fratenity as these two had crossed linguistic barriers considering the cultural complexities we have in India. Its an achievement on itself considering the humble backgrounds those two have.

Any announcement on his next film creates ripples around South India. His forthcoming film Sivaji has got the attention of even the North Indian audience who are normally reticent watching South Indian films, barring few. He has the ability to keep his fan following and presence intact inspite of an absolute no-no to interviews or selling products. The salary that he commands is many times than that of the biggest stars of Hindi Cinema. Inspite of all this, he is quite humble and simple, which we youngsters have to take a leaf out.Considering all this, he remains the ambassador of South India and the undisputed Super Star of Indian cinema.

Never seen a Sarath Kumar movie in a Cinema and so, it was a different experience indeed. He fits the role. Venkatesh, an upper middle class medical representative(They give intro for sarath as a middle class guy, but where in Chennai does a middle class guy lives in those posh independent houses).Lives happily with his wife kalyani(played gracefully by mumbai theatre artist andrea) and son nandha.Tragedy strikes their life when nandha was diagonised with type 1 diabetes. Kalyani who was showering her love on Venki till then turns her attention totally on their son. Yearning for love, Venkatesh meets Geetha(Jothika Saravanan) during the daily journey towards office in the train. Both feel for each other and plans to spend a day together in a resort. Lawrence, a petty theif comes in the scene and start threatening sarath and jothika. What happens next and how sarath comes out of the web is the remaining second half. Camera work was apt, not stylish like VV but helps to maintain the tempo of the film. Antony has come out of his cutting technique in editing. He has done an excellent job for the first time, atleast in the movies that I have seen of him. Flashes of conversations were superb, so is BGM. I would prefer gautham menon to change the portrayal of negative roles and the climax. Both were very similar to KK and VV.

What a movie !!! Stunning visuals and extraordinary performances. Mani Sir should come back to his roots again(make tamil films). I am a big ARR buff, but IR’s bgm was stunning, especially the piece whenever Karthik and Prabhu encounters. He is one among the world’s best in BGM,no doubt about it The villian’s role was a cameo but a filling one.Haven’t seen him after that film. Anybody have seen him after that?